by Rachel Aaron
NPC - non-player character. Any computer-controlled character in the game. NPCs can be friendly or hostile and are generally humanoid and/or intelligent. Note that this term is not usually applied to monsters.
PVE - Players vs. Environment. PVE content is any gameplay that involves the players fighting computer-generated enemies. Completing quests, fighting through a dungeon, and participating in a raid are all examples of PVE content.
PVP - Player vs Player. Some players consider fighting computer opponents too easy. They prefer to fight other real human players in specialized combat called "PVP." FFO has a couple of options for those who wish to only fight human-controlled opponents, including dueling, and participating in ranked gladiatorial combat leagues for special PVP equipment. (There's also an opt-in system for conducting PVP in quest zones.)
Dungeon / Instance - Dedicated group content is often arranged in self-contained areas called dungeons or instances. When a party or raid enters such an area, usually marked by a portal, the game will create a unique instance of that dungeon just for them. So 1000 groups can all be in the Red Canyon dungeon, but it will be a fresh storyline and battle for each and no group can see another in there. The same goes for the Dead Mountain Fortress and other raids.
Aggro - A term used to mean "a monster's attention." When a monster is attacking a player, that player is said to have aggro. Tanks have special abilities to draw monsters' aggro, or attention, to themselves to prevent the monsters from attacking more vulnerable classes.
Levels - Every monster and character in FFO has a power level. Player characters can range from level 1 to level 80 depending on how much they've played the game. Some monsters can be above level 80, such as the skeleton knights of the Dead Mountain Fortress and other monsters in the Deadlands. This is to provide a stiff challenge for powerful veteran players.
Skull Ratings – In addition to levels, all monsters and NPCs in FFO have a skull rating. The number of skulls a monster has beside their level shows how many players the developers think it will take to kill that monster. All beings in FFO are one-skull by default, meaning they can be killed with moderate ease by one same-level player, but there are many harder enemies that require coordinated player effort to take down. For example:
- Two-skull monsters are designed to be a challenge for two players.
- Three-skull monsters are designed to be a challenge for five players.
- Four-skull monsters are designed to be a challenge for ten-player raids.
- Five-skull monsters are for fifty-player raids only.
Two-skull monsters are often called bosses or sub-bosses. Four and five skull monsters are called raid bosses since any group larger than five players is considered a raid.
Gear / Loot – To help them master the world of FFO, player characters have magical equipment, which gives them about 90% of their power. Gear can be looted off the corpses of defeated enemy monsters, earned through completing quests, or won from defeating dungeons or raids. Magical equipment comes in the form of rings, amulets, weapons, and armor. Armor is broken down into nine different "slots" - head, shoulders, chest, belt, legs, feet, bracers, hands, and cloak. Player characters can equip one of each type of gear, but they can't wear more than one piece in the same slot at a time.
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Minimum Wage Magic
Return to the DFZ in Rachel's newest novel!
The DFZ, the metropolis formerly known as Detroit, is the world's most magical city with a population of nine million and zero public safety laws. That's a lot of mages, cybernetically enhanced chrome heads, and mythical beasties who die, get into debt, and otherwise fail to pay their rent. When they can't pay their bills, their stuff gets sold to the highest bidder to cover the tab.
That's when they call me. My name is Opal Yong-ae, and I'm a Cleaner: a freelance mage with an art history degree who's employed by the DFZ to sort through the mountains of magical junk people leave behind. It's not a pretty job, or a safe one--there's a reason I wear bite-proof gloves--but when you're deep in debt in a lawless city where gods are real, dragons are traffic hazards, and buildings move around on their own, you don't get to be picky about where your money comes from. You just have to make it work, even when the only thing of value in your latest repossessed apartment is the dead body of the mage who used to live there.
"A catchy title, a plucky protagonist and a maximum effort by the author, honestly readers can't ask for more in the urban fantasy genre."- Fantasy Book Critic
"I love what Rachel Aaron has done with this novel to expand her stories within this unique world of her creation. I have developed a trust in her ability to write engaging stories of great characters which I feel most comfortable and eager to spend time with, and this book is no exception." - TS Chan
Want to read more? We've included a free sample of Minimum Wage Magic in the back of this book!
Just keep paging forward to read more or click here to see it in ebook and audio!
The Heartstrikers Series
As the smallest dragon in the Heartstriker clan, Julius survives by a simple code: stay quiet, don't cause trouble, and keep out of the way of bigger dragons. But this meek behavior doesn't cut it in a family of ambitious predators, and his mother, Bethesda the Heartstriker, has finally reached the end of her patience.
Now, sealed in human form and banished to the DFZ--a vertical metropolis built on the ruins of Old Detroit--Julius has one month to prove to his mother that he can be a ruthless dragon or lose his true shape forever. But in a city of modern mages and vengeful spirits where dragons are seen as monsters to be exterminated, he's going to need some serious help to survive this test.
He just hopes humans are more trustworthy than dragons.
"Super fun, fast paced, urban fantasy full of heart, and plenty of magic, charm and humor to spare, this self published gem was one of my favorite discoveries this year!" - The Midnight Garden
"A deliriously smart and funny beginning to a new urban fantasy series about dragons in the ruins of Detroit...inventive, uproariously clever, and completely un-put-down-able!" - SF Signal
Want to read more? Click here to learn more about all 5 books in the award-winning Heartstrikers series!
The whole series is also available in audio from Audible.com!
The Legend of Eli Monpress
Eli Monpress is talented. He's charming. And he's the greatest thief in the world.
He's also a wizard, and with the help of his partners in crime--a swordsman with the world's most powerful magic sword (but no magical ability of his own) and a demonseed who can step through shadows and punch through walls--he's getting ready to pull off the heist of his career. To start, though, he'll just steal something small. Something no one will miss.
Something like... a king.
"I cannot be less than 110% in love with this book. I loved it. I love it still. Already I sort of want to read it again. Considering my fairly epic Godzilla-sized To Read list, that's just about the highest compliment I can give a book" - CSI: Librarian
"Fast and fun, The Spirit Thief introduces a fascinating new world and a complex magical system based on cooperation with the spirits who reside in all living objects. Aaron's characters are fully fleshed and possess complex personalities, motivations, and backstories that are only gradually revealed. Fans of Scott Lynch's Lies of Locke Lamora (2006) will be thrilled with Eli Monpress. Highly recommended for all fantasy readers." - Booklist, Starred Review
Click here to read more about The Legend of Eli Monpress, Rachel's debut Fantasy series, complete at 5 books!
The Paradox Trilogy
(written as Rachel Bach)
Devi Morris isn't your average merc
enary. She has plans. Big ones. And a ton of ambition. It's a combination that's going to get her killed one day - but not just yet.
That is, until she just gets a job on a tiny trade ship with a nasty reputation for surprises. The Glorious Fool isn't misnamed: it likes to get into trouble, so much so that one year of security work under its captain is equal to five years everywhere else. With odds like that, Devi knows she's found the perfect way to get the jump on the next part of her Plan. But the Fool doesn't give up its secrets without a fight, and one year on this ship might be more than even Devi can handle.
"Firefly-esque in its concept of a rogue-ish spaceship family... The narrative never quite goes where you expect it to, in a good way... Devi is a badass with a heart." - Locus Magazine
"If you liked Star Wars, if you like our books, and if you are waiting for Guardians of the Galaxy to hit the theaters, this is your book." - Ilona Andrews
"I JUST LOVED IT! Perfect light sci-fi. If you like space stuff that isn't that complicated but highly entertaining, I give two thumbs up!" - Felicia Day
Click here to read more about the Paradox trilogy, now complete!
Enjoyed FFO? You'll love
The DFZ, the metropolis formerly known as Detroit, is the world's most magical city with a population of nine million and zero public safety laws. That's a lot of mages, cybernetically enhanced chrome heads, and mythical beasties who die, get into debt, and otherwise fail to pay their rent. When they can't pay their bills, their stuff gets sold to the highest bidder to cover the tab.
That's when they call me. My name is Opal Yong-ae, and I'm a Cleaner: a freelance mage with an art history degree who's employed by the DFZ to sort through the mountains of magical junk people leave behind. It's not a pretty job, or a safe one--there's a reason I wear bite-proof gloves--but when you're deep in debt in a lawless city where gods are real, dragons are traffic hazards, and buildings move around on their own, you don't get to be picky about where your money comes from. You just have to make it work, even when the only thing of value in your latest repossessed apartment is the dead body of the mage who used to live there.
Keep reading for the free sample!
Chapter 1
The apartment looked like a fallout shelter.
It was in a sub-subbasement, twenty feet below street level down a wobbly flight of metal stairs so steep they were practically a ladder. The light at the bottom was burned out, of course, so the landing was pitch black. Also mysteriously wet. No idea how, since we hadn't had any rain in Detroit for a month, but these are the sort of lovely things you discover when you win a cheap bid.
"Gonna be one of those jobs, I see," I said, pulling my rubber gloves out of my bag.
"At least it's not big," Sibyl chirped in my ear, her computerized voice cheerful as always. "The building's custodian AI says the apartment's a one bedroom. I bet we can fit the whole thing in one truck."
"That's good," I said. "'Cause one truck is all I have."
I dug out my poncho next, grimacing as I pulled the slick, protective material over my sweat-dampened ponytail. Even down in the Underground where the sun never shone, the temperature was already in the upper eighties, and it wasn't even 9 a.m. Not good weather for covering yourself in plastic. But unlike my jeans and long-sleeved work shirt, my poncho was warded, and I'd learned the hard way that drowning in sweat was preferable to walking into someone's No Trespassing curse without protection.
"All right," I said, cinching the hood of my poncho tight under my chin so that I was draped head to toe in spellworked plastic. "Light 'er up."
The words were barely out of my mouth when the LEDs on the side of my AR goggles lit up like miniature suns, filling the dank stairwell with blazing white light. It was so bright that I missed the little red recording icon that came on next in the corner of my augmented-reality vision. Thankfully, AIs never forgot protocol.
"This is the video log for Unit 4B, Building 92, Detroit Free Zone Underground Block 14," Sibyl recited. "Purchase Date: Monday, July 22, 2115. Receipt #144528. Cleaner ID: Opal Yong-ae. Do you verify?"
"This is Opal Yong-ae, and I verify," I replied dutifully, hitting the button to flip to my interior camera for a shot of my sweat-streaked face beneath my protective gear. "Proceeding with occupant notification."
CYA out of the way, I slung my work bag around to my back and reached out to knock on the door, trying not to think too hard about the way the furry black spots on the paint squished under my gloves. "Cleaner," I announced loudly, thanking my lucky stars that I'd had the presence of mind to put on my rebreather before I'd climbed down into all this mold. "If you're inside, open up."
There was no reply. There was never a reply, but I always asked, because the one time I didn't, I just knew I'd open the door and find some junkie staring me down with a shotgun. Speaking of, I grabbed a fistful of local magic from the air and slapped it against my poncho to activate the antibullet wards. Just in case.
"Unit has no reply," I told my recorder. "Proceeding with reclamation."
"Ready when you are," Sibyl said, flagging the point in the video so that if someone tried to contest this job in arbitration later, I could point to the exact moment at which I stated my intent.
"This is Opal Yong-ae," I told the almost certainly empty apartment. "Subcontractor for Detroit Free Zone Habitation Management. You're thirty days behind on your rent and have not responded to multiple contact attempts from Collections. Therefore, by the terms of your rental agreement with the city, this apartment and all possessions therein are now property of the DFZ."
By which I meant property of me. When people skip town without paying their rent, the city takes their stuff to pay the bill. No bureaucrat wants to deal with sorting through someone else's abandoned junk, though, so they send the unit to auction, where it's bought by someone like me. I'm a Cleaner. I buy delinquent apartments in the hopes of selling what's inside for a profit. Sometimes I scored big. Other times--almost every time, recently--I paid for the privilege of shoveling trash.
Thankfully, on this particular unit, the bar for profit was practically on the ground. I'd gotten the whole thing for three hundred bucks, basically free, and despite the mold, I already had a good feeling about it. Just as in the picture that had convinced me to bid on the place, I could see the telltale marks of a ward beneath the dirt on the scuffed edges of the front door's frame. Wards were expensive, and expensive security meant good stuff.
"All right," I said when the silence on the other side of the door had stretched longer than the required thirty seconds. "Let's crack it open and see what we've got."
The red light vanished from my heads-up display as Sibyl stopped recording. I gave it a few seconds to be sure, and then I dug my gloved hand into the neck of my poncho to pull out the key I wore around my neck like a crucifix. The Master Key was a sacred object and a Cleaner's only real identification. It had been made for me by the Spirit of the City, and it could open any door in the DFZ if the city believed you had a right to be there.
That last bit was the tricky part. Unlike every other city in the world, the Detroit Free Zone was alive. Literally alive, with her own soul, mind, opinions, and, occasionally, off-the-books real estate deals. Collections tried their best to keep up, but they were only human. Sometimes rent was paid in ways that simply couldn't be reported. When that happened, it didn't matter how long a unit had been in collections. It would never open up.
In the one and a half years that I'd been Cleaning, I'd gotten a locked unit only once, but you didn't forget getting stiffed for two grand by the living goddess of your city. Thankfully, this was not going to be one of those days. The moment I touched my master key to the lock, the bright silver teeth rearranged themselves like water and slid right in, popping the deadbolt with a satisfying click.
The rest of the locks were another matter.
"Wow, this guy was paranoid," Sibyl said, bringing up density scanner results at the corner of my right eye. "I'm seeing four
more deadbolts, two chains inside, and a rod in the floor."
"Don't forget the ward," I added, poking at the spellwork I could just barely see painted across the rusted metal doorjamb with the steel toe of my boot. "Not that I blame him. Look at where he lived."
The cheap apartment block this unit was at the bottom of was located in one of the lowest points of the DFZ Underground, almost a hundred feet below the elevated bridges of the Skyways that divided the top half of the city--the part with sunlight, superscrapers, trendy restaurants, and luxury housing--from the Underground, a cavelike world of underpasses, neon, and cheap rent. Parts of the Underground were nicer than others. I, for example, lived in a perfectly respectable walk-up over in Hamtramck, or what had been Hamtramck before Detroit had been destroyed, rebuilt, destroyed again, and then rebuilt again. This wasn't one of the nice bits, though. It wasn't the worst, but it was as bad as I went voluntarily. I didn't have crime stats for the place, so maybe I was prejudging it, but in my experience, anywhere that had more vending machines for guns than for soda wasn't winning any safe-neighborhood awards.
"These should crack easy enough, though," I said, shining my lights into the gap between the door and the frame to get a better look at the locks. "The ward's the real problem. If we don't get rid of that, we'll be fried chicken."
